Chapter Text
If Rebecca could’ve picked the day her life changed forever, she isn’t sure she would’ve picked a Tuesday.
This particular Tuesday is an ordinary kind of Tuesday, as so many Tuesdays are. Though, perhaps it’s a little more cheerful than most, if only because Christmas is approaching. When she walks into Nelson Road that morning, the staff is draping tinsel across every surface, assembling artificial trees, and hanging decorations underscored by holiday music floating gently through the corridors.
Rebecca greets each person she sees with what has become her ordinary warmth. She is intercepted not-so-briefly near the entrance by Laughing Liam who flicks through perhaps 20 photos and three videos of the kitten he’d adopted for his children as an early Christmas gift. “They named him Lasagna, an homage to Garfield,” Liam tells her, his smile so broad and full of pride. Her heart swells painfully at the sight of his daughter, dark curls askew, pressing a tiny orange kitten to her face and crying into his fur.
Ordinary Tuesdays were still full of magic, weren’t they?
She thinks, not for the first time and probably not for the last, how unrecognizable to the Rebecca Welton of the recent past she would be now. The Rebecca who had her spirit slowly crushed out of her in an abusive marriage and the Rebecca so strangled by pain and rage she cut herself off from the world around her believing it would protect her. Liam never would've dared to stop either of those versions of her in this corridor, and she would've felt nothing looking at the photos other than bitter resentment.
So much has changed for the better.
But still, in her darker moments (and some have been longer than mere moments), she wonders whether feeling nothing is better than feeling too much.
Tell me more about that, Priya—the therapist she had finally started seeing after months of dragging her heels after Sharon had given her the recommendation—had said.
I’m just tired of everything hurting. Even the things that make me happy hurt me.
How so?
They remind me of what I don’t have.
Will you do something for me, Rebecca? Between now and our next session, focus on the things you do have. Write down three things every day. They don’t have to be different things every day. They don’t even have to be ‘good’ things or ‘things’ at all. You just have to have them.
She’d started with simple, irreverent things. Even those made her think about what she was missing.
So much money but nobody to spend it on
A very nice house that is too big and empty most of the time
Independence but I wouldn’t mind a little less
A job that I love (most of the time) but no bisc
So she tried simpler things.
A well-stocked wine fridge, an excellent shoe collection, great boobs, a Rolls-Royce, Richmond games in autumn, tea, movie nights with Nora.
The people in her life made frequent appearances. Higgins, Roy, Beard, Nora, Sassy. Even Jamie Tartt ended up on the list after he gave her the side of chips he’d accidentally received with his lunch one day.
Keeley was there quite a lot at the beginning, of course, but as her little homework assignment turned into more of a ritual, it also became scientific evidence of an almost imperceptible distance growing between them. Though they worked together now, they divided and conquered and their busy schedules frequently kept them apart. Rebecca had a growing paranoia that Keeley was pulling away from her, and Rebecca had no idea why, started chocking it up to her ever-present abandonment issues. But the little diary proved Keeley was a dwindling presence in her life. She wasn’t sure she could take another blow like that, so she hid from it. Ignored it. Pretended it wasn’t happening at all.
Instead, she tried to focus on how grateful she was. All these people she never could've claimed for her own just a few short years ago. Their strong and loving hands had held her up for the past year and a half, lifting her out of the darkness and despair that sometimes weighed her down so heavily she couldn’t leave her bed.
But there was one name glaringly absent.
Because she didn’t have him. Not anymore.
Learning to accept what you can’t change is a life-long process, Rebecca. It’s especially hard for those of us who like to have a sense of control. But I’ll tell you something that my mother always told me: Believe in miracles. I see you rolling your eyes, but I don’t mean that in some Jesus raising the dead sort of way. I mean…If you shut yourself off, you’ll stop seeing the beauty and the magic that’s all around you every day, you'll stop accepting the good things that come into your life. And even when the good things hurt, at least there’s still the good, right? Pain is inevitable, but so is good. And if there’s no good, then all you’re left with is hurt, and in my opinion, that’s no way to live.
It’s not an idea she warms up to quickly. Miracles sound too much like Tish’s particular brand of harmful bullshit for comfort. But perhaps more than that, believe is a yellow piece of paper taped above a door. It’s a corrupted word that she can only hear in his voice, and it hurts. It fucking hurts. But she tells Priya she’ll try, and Priya repeats a common refrain: that’s the best I can ask for.
Higgins greets her at the base of the stairs like he always does with a bright smile that rarely fails to make her smile. But even this hurts now, too, because Higgins told her privately last week that he’s been talking to Julie about retiring at the end of next season.
Just want to spend more time with the boys I’ve got left at home, and you’ve been so generous—
Please, Leslie. It’s still less than what you deserve. There will always be seats at Nelson Road for you and your family.
So she’s choosing instead to be grateful. Trying, anyway.
“It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas, isn’t it?” he says cheerfully, his eyebrows waggling.
“Congratulations, Leslie, you’re the first one to have said that to me. Well done,” she laughs as she pulls off her scarf and drapes it over her arm.
Leslie pumps his fist in a little motion of triumph. “One step closer to winning. I am determined to beat Beard this year.” He pulls out a square of paper from his pocket and has Rebecca sign her name next to It’s Beginning to Look a Lot like Christmas before he types a text into what she assumes is the Diamond Dogs group chat.
She wonders idly if he’s participating from a distance.
Rebecca rolls her eyes, but she smiles. “I’ll be very grateful when this little Christmas song war is over,” she says, quirking a brow.
“Ohhh very nice. I see we’ve got a new competitor in our midst, eh?”
“Somehow, I think I’ll live without that haunted fucking puppet living in my house.”
“It’s a vintage Christmas elf and a very dandy little gentleman, not a haunted puppet,” Higgins says, putting his hands up in the air.
“So, will the Higginses be hosting another gathering this year for all of our orphaned players?” she asks over her shoulder as she starts up the stairs.
“We couldn’t stop if we wanted to. I’m afraid Dani, as kind as he is, would simply never forgive me, and I’d be haunted by those sad puppy eyes for all eternity. You are of course more than welcome to join us, if you don’t have other plans.”
She brushes against a blotchy, purpling bruise.
“I’ll be sure to swing by after my rounds,” she replies, tucking the sadness away.
“Excellent,” Leslie gives her a thumbs up. “And I’m sorry.”
She schools her expression, hoping the pain in her heart hasn’t splashed onto her face without her realizing it.
“Whatever for, Leslie?” Rebecca asks as she pushes open the lid of her laptop.
“Preemptive apology for the preliminary budget accounts wants us to review that’s probably sitting at the top of your inbox right now,” Leslie says, grimacing.
“Ah, well. Who ever said working in football was glamorous? Thank you. I’m sure you have things to be getting on with,” she says as she taps open her email, huffing as she opens the budget attachment and sees it’s 50 pages long.
“Oh,” he says, waving his hand, “I’m happy to stay for a bit if you like.”
Rebecca glances up at him knowingly, “You’re sweet, but I’m fine.”
“Okay…” Leslie replies, apparently unconvinced. “I’ll see you later, then.”
When Leslie vanishes down the stairs, her shoulders slump and her smile fades.
Time is supposed to heal all wounds, she’s told. And maybe it’s trying, but every day without a a dimpled smiling face bursting through her door or familiar hands carrying a small pink box of biscuits, the stitches just rip open again. There’s no healing a wound that won’t close.
Leslie knew how much she missed it. Fucking everyone knew how much she missed it. Sometimes she wonders if he still misses it. She’s nearly asked him a few times, but she can never get up the courage to ask.
This empty block in her calendar is a reminder of something she has too much of. Absence.
It’s been a long time since she held him in her arms, yet she still feels him like a phantom limb. How absence could be its own kind of presence, she didn’t know, but she feels him everywhere. And it’s good, but it hurts.
Maybe time healed his wounds. Maybe he’s finally happy in Kansas. Maybe that’s why he doesn’t speak to her anymore.
It’s an ordinary Tuesday. She doesn’t need to make it a bad one by letting her mind linger too long on things she can’t change.
Fortunately, she gets sucked into a void of emails, a prolonged phone call about PR for the women’s team, a meeting with Roy (who brings her a Jammie Dodger, predictably insisting he just brought them for himself but had one to spare).
I need Jamie to get his idiot head out of his idiot arse. He’s moody because Felipe made a reference he didn’t understand, which I think brought him to the startling revelation that he’s closer to 30 than to 20 and now he’s running too slow because he’s worried about ‘his heart’ or some shit like that. Told him he’s being a pissbaby and he’s probably just got acid reflux and to go to a fucking doctor.
It’s 15:21 when her phone rings.
A perfectly ordinary time.
Rebecca is a bit sluggish. She shouldn’t have had pasta for lunch, but she was craving it and couldn’t help herself and life is too short not to enjoy these little indulgences, after all. But now her eyes are losing focus, slipping right off the budget she’s supposed to be carefully reviewing. She’s just thinking about calling Keeley to see if she wants to pop out for a coffee (though she’s not sure she can handle the inevitable rejection) when the phone buzzes loudly on the desk.
When she glances at her phone, it’s an unknown London number. She thinks about letting it go to voicemail, feeling more like a sleepy arse bitch than a boss one.
She sighs, recognizing that it might be important. She’s expecting a call from an agent about a possible new player and this could be him. So she slides her finger across the screen, not yet knowing that the simple gesture would change her life forever, and puts the phone to her ear.
“Hello?” she says.
“Is this Rebecca Welton?” says a woman’s voice, one she didn’t recognize. Firm, but perhaps a bit frayed.
“It is. Might I ask who is calling?” Rebecca asks in her most professional cadence.
“Sorry. Yes…We met very briefly several months ago. My name is Jade Harper.” Rebecca is silent. Jade Harper. It’s a familiar name, but she finds nothing when she tries to reach for a face or a memory connected to it. “I’m a solicitor.” Still nothing. “I…erm…represent Rebecca Longhaven. Bex?” she explains, finally connecting the wires in Rebecca’s brain.
“Of course, Jade. I remember you.”
It’s not exactly a happy memory. Rebecca and Bex had consulted with Jade and Rebecca’s solicitor when they decided to come forward about Rupert last year.
But Rupert was dead.
Her impatient brain is already jumping to conclusions about why on earth Jade would be calling her now.
“I’m sorry for…This is a very difficult call to make. Are you somewhere private?” Jade asks, that weariness creeping back into her voice.
Anxiety brews in the bottom of her stomach, turns into a tight knot that strains her breath. “I…Yes. I’m sorry…Is this to do with Rupert?”
The only logical explanation she can conceive is that someone must be suing her for defamation, though who would be rushing to defend Rupert’s rotting corpse, she had no idea.
“No, no. It’s…erm…Rebecca, Bex was in…an accident.” Jade, whom Rebecca remembered as a powerful, towering, take-no-shit woman, sounded rattled.
The knot tightens, “Oh. God…is she alright?”
“I’m sorry to say that she passed away. Just a couple of hours ago.”
Her brain threads together an incongruent tapestry of emotion. Light shock, deep confusion. A drizzle of sadness. A coating of guilt. Shouldn’t she cry? Shouldn’t she feel heartbreak? Why is her first thought why are you telling me this?
She hadn’t known Bex well, but she had grown to like her. And now, Bex was gone. There would never be a chance to know her any better than she did. Bex is…was…a bright young woman. After her divorce from Rupert, she hoped to attend graduate school, which she had put off because of her relationship. She had an encyclopedic knowledge of The Real Housewives. She put far too much faith in essential oils and aluminum-free deodorant (whatever the fuck that was) for Rebecca’s liking. She was a loving, attentive mother.
Remembering this, Rebecca quickly asks, “Is Diane alright?”
“Diane is fine, luckily,” Jade says reassuringly. “She was in the car when…By some miracle, she’s almost completely unscathed aside from a few scrapes and bruises.”
Believe in miracles, she thinks, though the sentiment feels dissonant with the grim reality.
“I’m actually at the hospital now with Petra, her nanny. They’re going to monitor her here for one more night, just to be absolutely certain. Car accidents can have…hidden complications, I’m told.”
Tears brim along Rebecca’s waterline thinking about that poor, sweet girl, orphaned in the course of just a few months. “What will happen to her? Once she’s released?”
“That’s…well, that’s actually why I’m calling, Rebecca. But I think this is a conversation that might be better in person. Are you able to come to the hospital now?” Rebecca’s vision narrows and her mind fills with a crackling white noise. “Rebecca?”
“Sorry…Yes, of course. I’ll be there as quickly as I can.”
When she hangs up the phone, she gathers her things. The growing tremor in her body makes it more taxing to shrug her coat back over her shoulders, wrap her scarf around her neck, and pull on her gloves.
Rebecca hurries towards Higgins’ office and pokes her head in. His back is to the door, he’s humming and apparently in the middle of watering one of his office plants. “Leslie?” He jumps at her voice, splashing a bit of water on the ground. “Ah…Sorry, I was just getting to that budget…”
“Something unexpected has come up, and I’ve got to head out for probably the rest of the day.”
“Is everything alright?” he asks, reading the probably plain lines of concern etched all over her face.
“That’s a hard question to answer. I’ll explain everything to you tomorrow, okay?”
“Call if you need anything. You know I’ll be wherever you need in a heartbeat.”
Rebecca closes the distance between them in a few strides and does something she hardly ever did. She gives him a tight hug and kisses his cheek. This clearly surprises him because at first he tenses up, but then he relaxes and returns the hug. “I know. And…thank you, Leslie. I’m very grateful for you.”
“I’m trying to not be overly concerned about where this is coming from, but I am very grateful for you, too.”
“Don’t worry.” Rebecca releases him, giving him a soft smile that doesn’t reach her eyes as she heads out the door.
The hospital is on the other side of London but it’s as though the drive stretches on for hours. She stares out the window without seeing, focusing on a few deep breathing exercises in an attempt to slow the quickening spiral of her thoughts.
“Thank you, David. I’ll text you when I’m ready to go,” she says and then tosses in a, “Be careful,” for good measure.
Like Nelson Road, they’d strung the hospital lobby up in holiday lights and decorations. No matter how hard they’d attempted to make it look warm and inviting, she couldn’t dispel the unsettling sensation of being in a hospital. Life and death were in such close proximity at all times, she knew, but in a hospital that veil was thin enough to set her teeth on edge.
Jade had texted her instructions on how to find her. She steps out of the elevator onto what was clearly not a patient floor. There was a reception desk and several small meeting rooms stretching down the corridor. Jade herself stands in front of a vending machine dispensing coffee into a styrofoam cup. She wears denim and a quarter-zip sweater, her braids piled loosely on top of her head. Rebecca, ridiculously, feels slightly embarrassed to be in such formal attire, like she’s shown up overdressed for a casual function.
“Jade?” Rebecca calls out to her. She turns, and Rebecca can immediately see that she looks frail and exhausted. Rebecca wonders how long she’s been here.
“Ah, Rebecca. It’s good to see you again, though I wish it were under happier circumstances,” Jade says, reaching her free hand out to Rebecca and shaking it loosely.
“Same to you,” Rebecca says, wishing she could stop sounding so fucking meek.
“Follow me,” Jade says, summoning Rebecca with a wave of her hand and leading her to a small conference room. “Sorry about the light. These things should be bloody illegal,” she says, pointing upward to the harsh fluorescent ceiling light above them. Jade goes to sit at the end of the table littered with pieces of paper and an open laptop.
Rebecca tugs off her gloves and her coat, flexing her hands when she realizes they’re still shaking. When she sits opposite Jade, she folds them over her lap, hoping Jade wouldn’t notice.
“So, as you might guess, I am the executor of Bex’s will. Which, fortunately, thanks to my relentless urging, she did have. Do you have a will, Rebecca?”
“I…I do,” Rebecca said, though she hadn’t looked at it in years, but knows it states that most of her money will end up getting donated to the Richmond Foundation and the rest will go to Nora.
“Good, good. I’m very persistent with my clients. It’s an awful business, but it makes these inevitable things much easier for the people we leave behind.” Well, Rebecca at least doesn’t think she’ll leave behind much of a mess to clean up. “Obviously, our biggest concern right now is Diane. I’m not sure how well you knew Bex, but I got to know her quite well over the past couple of years with the divorce and…everything else.” Rebecca pitied Jade a little for having to contend with Rupert’s formidable lawyer, a truly abhorrent man named Geoffrey Breckenridge. “Bex’s father passed away when she was a teenager, and she severed ties with her mother for reasons I don’t fully understand. But I made sure this thing,” Jade picks up some of the papers and shakes them to underline her point, “was ironclad so that her mother would have no legal claim to Diane. That was important to Bex.”
“Um…good,” Rebecca concurs, not sure how to react to all of this information.
“Bex has no other family, and neither, as I’m sure you know, does Rupert. After Rupert died, I spoke with Bex about who she wanted to entrust the care of her child to should anything happen, and the person she named…was you.”
Jade slides a single sheet of paper across the table towards Rebecca.
Nausea slicks the back of her throat.
She pulls her reading glasses out from her bag and tentatively picks up the paper, knowing Jade could now clearly see how much her hand is shaking. She glances at it, tempted to read it through one eye like that might soften the blow.
In the event of my passing before my child is of legal adult age, I, Rebecca Longhaven, entrust the full legal rights and responsibilities of guardianship for Diane Persephone Longhaven to Rebecca Welton, should she consent to accepting them. Should Rebecca Welton not consent…
Rebecca’s eyes go blurry from reading the same sentence again and again. She’d suspected this was the reason she’d been called, but it’s still hard to stomach.
“I’m guessing by the look on your face, you weren’t aware of this?”
“N-no. I didn’t know,” Rebecca says, voice pinched.
“Well,” Jade sighs, “I’m sure that Bex, like most of us, assumed it would never matter.”
“So…what does this mean?” Rebecca had never found it harder to find words in all of her life. It’s like her brain is treacle, slow and stupid and unable to keep up with the information it’s receiving.
If Jade finds her questions insipid or idiotic, she doesn’t show it. “This means that should you choose to accept this responsibility, you will, for all intents and purposes, become Diane’s parent. Diane is, of course, the heir to all of Rupert and Bex’s assets. As the executor of Bex’s estate, I am primarily responsible for managing her money. The same is true for Breckenridge with Rupert’s. This money will be dispensed to you with the understanding it will be used to pay for her education, other necessities, and any financial…hardship her care might incur upon you. Forgive my crassness, but I doubt it would cause you much hardship.” Rebecca cracks half a smile at this. “I am responsible for overseeing her financial well-being until she turns 18, and the trust fund left to her by Rupert will be available when she turns 22.”
“I see…” Rebecca says thickly, digesting the information.
“Additionally, if you do consent, a social worker will be assigned to you for the first three months just to make sure the transition is safe and smooth.”
“And what happens if I don’t? Consent, I mean.”
“You are of course not obligated to. There is no law that can compel you to do this if you do not wish to. If you say no, I would still control her finances until she comes of age, and she would go into government custody. I don’t say this to guilt you, Rebecca, but it’s hard to know exactly what would happen in that scenario.”
“There’s nobody else?” Rebecca asks.
“There’s nobody else,” Jade confirms. “I know this is a lot to take in. Would you like a moment alone?”
Rebecca nods. Jade stands, pauses on her way out to place her hand onto Rebecca’s shoulder and give it a gentle squeeze.
“Jade?” Rebecca calls out to her before she steps through the door. Jade turns to her. “I’m sorry for your loss.”
Jade gives her a sad smile and says, “Thank you,” before she exits the room.
For a long while, Rebecca stares at the blank grey wall, her eyes going in and out of focus.
She longs to turn back the clock, desperately wishing she could ask Bex why she had chosen Rebecca, of all people. The two of them had little in common aside from the unfortunate error of marrying Rupert Mannion. Rebecca hadn’t even spoken to Bex since his funeral. Surely Bex had friends, a support network of some kind, people she knew far better than Rebecca.
But did she?
Hadn’t most of Rebecca’s own relationships been casualties of her marriage to Rupert?
Priya told her, abusers have a vested interest in making their victims completely dependent on them.
It’s not even a stretch to think Bex had suffered similarly beneath Rupert’s imperious thumb. And maybe, like Rebecca, she had to glue back together the pieces of her life that Rupert had broken.
And apparently, Bex had decided that among whomever might’ve been left in her life, it was Rebecca she trusted enough for this.
How strange to think that after all the heartache and sorrow and regret, she could end up raising Rupert’s child after all.
Rebecca didn’t know how to feel. Didn’t know what to say.
Believe in miracles.
Is that what this was? She feels sick to her stomach for even thinking it. Bex was dead. She had died in a senseless and cruel way, and now her daughter wouldn’t get to grow up with her mother. She’s young enough that Rebecca can’t even be sure Diane will remember Bex in the years to come. There is nothing miraculous about it.
There are too many thoughts in her head, no order she can find amongst the chaotic jumble. She wants to scream or cry or throw something at the unfairness of it all. And she feels selfish for even wanting to do that because this isn’t really about her at all.
Most of all, she’s angry. Angry because this is too big a decision to make on her own, but she doesn’t have anyone to talk to about it. It’s that same helpless feeling she had at the fertility clinic when she stared at a rote intake form and saw yawning emptiness staring back at her from the emergency contact line.
She remembers too vividly what name she wanted to write down then, and it’s the same person she wants to call now. And it isn’t fair that she still feels this way.
Rebecca opens up the favorites menu on her phone. There’s only four names there: Keeley, her mother, Leslie, and…
Her thumb hesitates over his name for a long time, heart in her throat.
It’s been a long time since she’s heard his voice. And it’s unlikely he’d even pick up for her. For Christ’s sake, she’s had a conversation with Michelle more recently than him. For his birthday, she wanted to buy tickets for him and Henry to the Kansas City tour stop of Six and she needed to coordinate with schedules she had no reason to know anything about. And she’d even asked Michelle if she should buy a third ticket for her, perhaps her own subtle way of nosing around the status of their relationship (Michelle had declined). Afterwards, she received a picture of Henry with his playbill standing in front of the stage with a text that said “Happy Birthday to us! Thank you!” He wasn’t in the photo, though.
She’d responded:
You’re very welcome. Hope you enjoyed the show 💜
No response.
She isn’t certain if it’s a jerk of her thumb or an intentional choice, but the next thing she knows the phone is ringing and she’s pulling it up to her ear.
Believe in miracles.
So she does. She believes.
The phone rings.
And rings.
And rings.
And the fourth ring cuts short.
“Hello?”
The word is full of disbelief or maybe it’s wonder or maybe it’s both. But no matter what it is, his voice feels like home.
Her heart spirals out of her throat in the shape of his name. “Ted,” she sighs. “Hi.”
“Rebecca?” he says, apparently still stunned.
There are so many feelings whirling around inside her, each one of them trying to get a foothold, but something about his surprise makes her laugh, pops the tension ballooning in her chest. “No, just a highly realistic robocall. Can you wire me £25,000?”
“You know, I did read an article about all that A.I. crap that really freaked me out, so…I wouldn’t hate a little reassurance that it’s really you—”
“The first concert you ever went to was Kenny Rogers, but the best one was the Beastie Boys.”
Somehow, she can hear him smiling. “Well, heck. It’s really good to hear your voice, Rebecca,” he says, but she thinks she hears his voice break on her name.
She could say phones work two ways, you know or you’d hear it every day if you hadn’t left, but she hadn’t called him to reprimand him. There are things Ted can’t change either and it does no one any good to punish him over and over again. Even if she wants to. A little.
“You, too,” she replies, already fighting back tears. Hearing his voice again is painful, but it’s good, too.
“So, uh…Not that you need any reason to call, but to what do I owe the pleasure?”
“I…” She tries to summon words to her lips, but they won’t come. “Tell me about you, first. Did I catch you at a bad time?”
“No such thing as a bad time when it’s you.” The words fall out of his lips easily, and she wonders if he regrets saying them because he pauses to clear his throat. It borders on overfamiliarity. It’s the way he talked to her when they were still close. “I’m walkin’ to the cafe on campus. Just finished the season last weekend, so not too much to be gettin’ on with.”
“Congratulations, Coach,” she says, though she regrets saying the title as soon as it’s out of her mouth. “How did it go?”
She knows the answer. She’s followed their progress all season.
“Third place in the entire division, which is nothin’ to sneeze at considerin’ they were third from last the season before I got here,” he says.
“Sounds like the Lasso Way is working, then. No surprise there.”
“Aw, nah. I hardly got nothin’ to do with it. They’re the ones puttin’ in the work out on the pitch.”
The ache in her chest deepens with her laugh. “I think you mean field.”
Ted just says, “Change is hard.”
“Too right,” she exhales. “Ted, I…I’m calling because—”
“Are you okay?” he cuts in.
“Yes, I’m okay,” she says even though it feels like a lie. “I received a call today because…You remember Bex?”
“Yeah,” he says, “‘Course I do.”
She closes her eyes and sees a dart hitting a bullseye.
“Well, I’m sorry to say she passed away. Car accident.”
“Oh,” Ted says, “That’s awful. I’m sorry to hear it.”
His sympathy is earnest, she knows, but she can hear the question in his voice.
“I’ve just been told by her solicitor that…According to her will—”
Anxiety forces her to stand up and pace the short distance across the conference room.
She swallows tightly. “She named me Diane’s guardian. I had…I had no idea.”
“Oh, wow,” Ted says. She listens as he blows a puff of air out from between his cheeks, “Okay. How are you feelin’ about that?”
She leans her back against the wall and closes her eyes. To anyone else, she’d probably say I’m fine or I’m handling it. But she can’t lie to Ted. “I’m fucking terrified.”
“It’s okay to be scared,” he says softly, “It’s okay to feel whatever else you might be feelin’, too.”
His reassurance calms her, emboldens her honesty. “I don’t know what to do. If I say no, I’m consigning her to…uncertainty. I’m the only shot she has at a stable fucking life.” And sometimes Rebecca feels anything but stable.
“You can’t know that for sure,” he says, “If your gut is tellin’ you no—”
“It’s not,” she interjects.
“I didn’t think it probably was.”
“You’re tricky,” she says, smiling.
“Who, me?” he says slyly. He pauses before he says, “You’re scared because you wanna say yes.”
The tears start falling freely from her eyes, and she tries to repress the sniffle that accompanies them, but she can’t hide from Ted. “It’s okay. Feel what you feel. I’ll be here whenever you’re ready.”
I’ll be here echoes through the hollow space in her chest. Because he isn't. He isn't here.
She takes his advice and lets herself cry, ungracefully wiping her snotty nose on her scarf for lack of a better option, irritated that a bloody hospital conference room has no tissues, which makes her cry just a little harder.
“I’m sorry,” she says as the sobs die out.
“No apology necessary. Coupon for life, remember?”
I remember, she thinks, do you?
“C’mon,” he says quickly, like he’s realized he’s made an error, “Tell me what you’re afraid of. Forget the Ghostbusters, I’m Ted Lasso, Fearbuster. I’ve got a black belt in this sorta thing. I’ve got it on good authority from one eleven year old who accidentally watched Watership Down at too tender an age and was terrified of bunny rabbits for at least three months. Absolute blubberin’ when his grandma gave him a chocolate bunny for Easter. But I can proudly say, he has since recovered from that affliction thanks to me and a lot of therapeutic theatrical performances of Peter Rabbit and The Velveteen Rabbit, not that that one's particularly comfortin'...Anyway, I got practice. So hit me.”
She laughs. It’s thick and broken, but it lightens the pressure between her ribs.
“It’s…Well, it’s quite a lot of responsibility, and I’ve got no experience.”
“Yeah, but you’re Rebecca fuckin’ Welton, Boss Ass Bitch.”
“I suppose,” she says, biting back a grin.
“Nah. You don’t need to be humble. It’s not like you’d owned a Premier League football club before you did that and look at you now, poised to win the whole fuckin’ thing.”
He’s not wrong. Richmond is in excellent form, in no small part thanks to the successful recruitment of Felipe Florez, the hottest new player in the league and the root of Jamie Tartt’s quarter life crisis, apparently. She knows how he feels about Richmond performing better without him as head coach. Rebecca and everyone else knows well that it’s because of what he’s built here that it’s even a possibility, and she’s sure Ted would say he feels nothing but pride. But she knows in his heart of hearts, he thinks it’s proof that he’s not really needed here. And as always, she’s compelled to remind him that it isn’t true.
“As it happens, Ted, the most genius decision I ever made as manager was also the first one I ever made.”
“Sellin’ that Hockney?” he says.
“No,” she replies, “Even before that.”
Ted coughs and says, “Well. I guess that just proves my point, even if I debate the veracity of that claim. Next fear, please.”
Rebecca sucks the inside of her cheek between her teeth. Her voice gets quiet, like saying it too loud will make it true, “What if I’m not suited for it?”
“You are,” he says it like the same way he’d say gravity is the force that keeps us from floating away into space. Like it’s incontrovertible. Like it’s true.
“How do you know?” she asks. The question sounds so fucking childish.
“Because I know you.” The tears strike up again. “You got more love in your heart than anyone I’ve ever met. And you got a lotta strength in those action-figurey arms, too. There ain’t nothin’ you can’t do.”
He’s echoing what he told her years ago when he held her in his arms after he’d forgiven her for something she believed was unforgivable. There ain't nothin' you can't get through. But this time, he left out the most important part. Together.
“Christ,” she wheezes, “You really know how to make a girl cry.”
“Not a skill I’m very fond of, I’ll admit,” he says gravely.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—”
“Nope. This isn’t about me. And brace yourself, I have a feelin’ I might be about to make you cry a little more,” he says, a laugh in his voice, but the kind of laugh someone releases when they’re trying not to cry themselves. “There’s somethin’ else you’ve got experience in in spades. When I was goin’ through a hard time, you saved me. And now that little girl is goin’ through somethin’ no child should ever have to go through, but there’s no changin’ it. If there is a miracle to be found amongst this tragedy, it’s that she’s gonna have you lookin’ out for her now. Ain’t nobody better, and that’s a fact.”
Believe in miracles.
She’s sobbing again, as he predicted. Through blinding tears, she sputters, “But what if I fuck up teaching her how to read?”
Ted laughs. “One thing you gotta accept now is that no parent knows a fuckin’ thing.”
Parent.
“If you don’t know what to do, you call me day or night. Cash in that coupon. I don’t know everything, but mine’s turnin’ out okay so far, so I might be able to help.”
She’s been reaching in the dark for so long, searching for some kind of tether that might bring him back to her, even if it’s only by inches, and now her hand has finally closed on something real.
Believe in miracles.
“I might just take you up on that. Thank you,” she says.
Ted is silent, but she can hear him breathing. “And that’s not to say you can’t call me for other reasons…If you want to.”
Her breath hitches in her chest.
“Same to you, Ted. Don’t be a stranger.”
“Okay,” he breathes like a weight has lifted off his chest. “You okay?”
“I’m…Something. But…thank you, Ted. Really.”
“Always,” he says, “I believe in you, Rebecca. You got this.”
There’s so much more she wants to say to him, so much she wants to ask. But now is not the time, and she hangs up with the comfort of knowing that this is a beginning rather than an end.
Rebecca presses both palms to her chest and takes the deepest breath she’s taken all day.
Jade tries to explain the legalities while they travel to the floor where Diane is, but Rebecca isn’t really listening. Nerves flutter in her stomach, feeling more like a million spiders than butterflies.
Rebecca interrupts whatever she's saying with, “Jade? Sorry…Can we maybe go to the gift shop before we see her?”
Jade smiles and silently presses the lobby button on the elevator.
Rebecca is looking around the gift shop like she’s never seen one before. She doesn’t have the foggiest what Diane likes and unfortunately Jade isn’t much help. Her eye is drawn to a small pink teddy bear clutching a love heart between its paws. It’s soft and squishy and with a pang, she realizes the shade of pink reminds her of Ted's biscuit boxes.
The bear is enduring a teddy bear-sized earthquake in her nervous hands by the time they approach the door to the hospital room. Through the open blinds, Rebecca can see a small body with blonde curls, plump, rosy cheeks, and a butterfly bandage on her temple. She’s fast asleep in a bed that is much too big for her. In a chair beside her is another sleeping figure, a woman probably in her 30s with long, dark hair. Petra, Rebecca assumes.
Jade says, “I’m going to go get some fresh air and call your solicitor to start getting the legalities squared away. You alright?”
Rebecca nods, clutches the small pink teddy bear closer to her chest for comfort.
“Ohmygod, Ms. Welton!” squeaks a voice from behind her. She turns on her heel and sees a rather short young woman, an eager hand already extended. “I’m Gray Steeple. Social worker. I’m a huge fan.” She’s looking up at her through stylish, thick-lensed glasses, her smile at complete odds with the situation at hand.
“Oh,” she says, “Well, you look like a person to me.”
“Huh?” Gray says.
“Nevermind. Pleasure to meet you, Gray,” she says, returning the handshake with as much confidence as she can muster.
“Oh, I assure you,” Gray says as she shakes Rebecca’s hand enthusiastically, “the pleasure is all mine. I’ve been assigned to Diane’s case. How are you feeling about our odds against Chelsea?”
“What?”
“Chelsea? On Saturday?”
Rebecca pinches the bridge of her nose and says, “Sorry, Gray. I’ve…There’s a few other things on my mind right now.”
“God, right, of course. I’m sorry.” Gray says solemnly, scratches the back of her head. “Can I tell you something?” she asks. Rebecca nods. Gray steps closer and whispers furtively, “This is actually my first case, and I’m just a bit nervous. Especially because, well, it’s you, and I’m obsessed with your whole…thing.”
Rebecca doesn’t know what her whole thing is, but she appreciates the sentiment all the same.
“I understand,” she says, her lips curling up into a kind smile, “This is actually my first time inheriting a child, so I suppose we’re in similar boats.”
Gray smiles broadly, and Rebecca sees a bit of the tension drip out of her shoulders. “Right. I’m very sorry. And I’m sorry I didn’t start with that.”
“No apology necessary.”
“As Diane’s social worker, just so you know I’ll be required to stop by once a week for the next three months just to do a quick report.” She understands the necessity of it, but the idea of being monitored and judged makes her palms sweat. “And, of course, you’ll have my number and you can reach out to me whenever for whatever. Obviously about Diane, but also, like, for a drink because I have so many questions.”
Rebecca laughs, but she sees Diane out of the corner of her eye and tampers down the smile, flattens her skirt beneath her palms, feels guilty for laughing at a time like this. She clears her throat and says, “Has…Has Diane been…Does she know? About her mother?”
This sobers Gray, too. “No,” she says. “She’s been pretty out of it since arriving here late last night.”
“I do have a question.” Gray gestures for her to proceed. “I…Well, it’s probably no surprise to you that my home isn’t exactly…child ready?”
The only child who had ever stayed in her home was Nora who was long past needing the kinds of things a toddler would.
“No worries,” she says kindly, “She’ll be here in hospital for one more night, and Petra has offered to stay with her night and day at Bex’s home until you’re ready.”
Rebecca feels like she should be the one staying with Diane night and day, but of course it makes sense to stay in a familiar place with a familiar person, even if it’s only delaying the inevitable. “I’ll…Tomorrow I can at least get the essentials.” Rebecca didn’t even know what the essentials were. Does a nearly three year old still sleep in a crib? She adds it to a mental list of things to ask Ted.
“I’ve got to run away to start on some paperwork, but you can go in if you’d like.”
Rebecca realizes she’s been delaying crossing the threshold into the room like it’s some symbolic point of no return.
“Right.” She adjusts her blouse foolishly, a nervous habit she instinctively performs before walking into a business meeting. Gently, she opens the door. The dark-haired woman stirs and she whispers, “Sorry.”
“Oh, it’s okay,” she stays, mashing the heel of her hand into one red-rimmed eye, “I’m Petra.”
“Rebecca,” she says, one eye on Diane’s still sleeping form, “I’m…so very sorry for your loss, Petra.”
Petra’s eyes brim with tears and she can do little more than nod. When she collects herself again she says, “I know of you. Ms. Bex talked about you. You are the one who—” she cuts herself off. “You were married to her ex-husband.”
“Guilty,” Rebecca says, grimacing.
“They told me Diane would be in your charge. I think you are an excellent choice.”
Rebecca has no idea what would give a complete stranger this impression, but she’s grateful. “Thank you. How long have you been here?”
“Just since the morning. I was here when…” Tears again.
“Petra,” Rebecca says, thinking that perhaps there’s at least one thing she can do for this woman in her time of grief. “I obviously have quite a lot to figure out, but…I would be more than happy to continue to employ you, if you’d like.”
Petra smiles, “Thank you, Ms. Welton. That is very kind.” She looks at Rebecca nervously.
“What is it?”
“I had actually given Ms. Bex my notice. My mother is ill, and I need to return home. But I didn’t think…I didn’t know—” Petra presses a fist against her mouth to stifle her renewed sobs.
“Oh,” Rebecca says, stepping forward to place a comforting hand on Petra’s shoulder, “Nobody ever could’ve known, Petra. Don’t guilt yourself over it. When are you leaving?”
Petra brushes away her tears and takes a deep, shuddering breath. “Sunday. But I can delay—”
“No, no,” Rebecca coos, “You should go be with your mother. We’ll be alright.”
“Okay. Okay. Thank you.” Petra stifles a yawn. “I think I need another coffee. Will you be alright alone?”
“Of course. Go, please. Take your time.” Petra nods and exits the room.
Rebecca stands frozen in the room for a long moment, unsure what to do. She takes Petra’s abandoned chair. Watching Diane, angelic in sleep, she smooths her palms over her skirt and nervously circles the teddy bear’s soft ear with thumb and forefinger.
Only a couple of minutes pass before Diane stirs and wakes. Blinking into awareness, she doesn’t shrink back or appear fearful of Rebecca’s sudden presence, much to her relief, but Rebecca wishes there was a familiar face in the room.
“Hi,” Diane says softly.
Rebecca smiles with what she hopes is her softest smile and says, “Hi Diane.” She glances out the window and sees no one. “You probably don’t remember, but…We’ve met before. I’m Rebecca.”
“Becca,” Diane repeats.
“That’s right,” Rebecca says, having no clue whether there’s any recognition in her tiny brain, but feeling aglow all the same. “I got this for you,” she says, offering the bear to her.
Diane reaches her small hands outward, smiling as she takes it and clutches it to her chest. “I love him,” she says simply. It snaps Rebecca’s heart cleanly in two. “What’s his name?”
Rebecca smiles, “He doesn’t have one yet because he was waiting for you to give him one.”
Diane bites her lip, thinking hard before she says, “Teddy.”
“That’s…a very good name,” Rebecca says, holding herself together with everything she has.
“I want Teddy to meet mummy. Where’s mummy?”
Rebecca swallows down a hard lump in her throat. She has no fucking idea what to say. There’s no time to call Ted, to ask anyone for advice on how you’re supposed to tell a toddler that her mother has died. There’s still nobody outside the window. Just her.
“Diane,” she says, tears spiking behind her eyes, “I’m so very sorry. You and your mummy were in an accident. Your mummy…she died. ”
It feels harsh, far too punishing for such a small child. It’s the kind of brutal forthrightness her mother had always used to deliver bad news. But the words are already out of her mouth. She tells herself that Diane is too young to understand the euphemisms adults use to soften the blow of death. Rebecca has never cared for them much anyway.
Diane accepts this information, but her reaction is muted.
“Do you know what that means?” Rebecca asks, seeing that she recognizes the word, but maybe can’t quite place its meaning.
“Like papa?”
Rebecca nods, her nails digging into the heel of her hand. It broke her heart that one so small should already have a reference point this, even if Rebecca didn’t feel much sorrow over that particular death. “Yes. Like your papa.”
Tears brim along the rims of Diane’s blue eyes. Rupert’s eyes. “Is mummy coming back?”
The innocence and the hope in the question shatters Rebecca into a million pieces. She feels evil. Even though she had no hand in Bex’s death, even though there is absolutely nothing Rebecca can do to change what is, she wishes more than anything in the world that she could tell Diane what she wants to hear. But she can’t.
“No. She isn’t coming back,” she says as gently as she can. This, Diane understands. The immutability of it cracks her open, a high, keening wail breaking loose from her small form. It’s the worst sound Rebecca has ever heard.
She pulls the chair as close to the bed as she can. Unsure of the scope of Diane’s injuries, she’s afraid to touch her, but she hopes that Diane feels her closeness. Rebecca doesn’t tell her to be quiet, offers no words of comfort, just lets the girl cry until she can’t anymore.
“I wanna go home,” Diane whispers. She’s cherry red and puffy and her curls are askew. Tentatively, Rebecca reaches out a hand to smooth them, but Diane turns her head away. Rebecca pulls her hand back, starts spinning one of her rings.
“The doctors want to make sure you’re safe and healthy, so you are going to sleep here tonight, okay?”
Diane doesn’t react to this.
“And then…You’re going to come home with me. I—” Rebecca pauses to still her shaking voice. “I’m going to look after you.”
Tears well up in Diane’s eyes again. “I don’t want you. I want mummy!” She stuffs her face into Teddy’s tummy and howls.
Rebecca knows she’s a grieving child. Knows how incomprehensible this all would be even if Diane was much older. Knows this reaction has nothing to do with Rebecca at all. It stings all the same.
So rarely is Rebecca at a loss for words, but she is now. She can’t say I know when she doesn’t. She can’t say it’s okay when it isn’t. Once again, she’s struck silent, feeling inadequate and useless and terribly small.
A truth that long ago latticed itself between her muscle and her bone pulses to the rhythm of her heartbeat. Never enough. Never enough. Never enough. She would never be enough for this girl, she would never fill the void her mother left behind. She didn’t want to have to.
“I’m sorry, Diane. I’m so sorry.” I’m sorry this happened to you. I’m sorry that your mother died and all you get is me.
And she’s sitting there helplessly wondering if she’s made the biggest miscalculation of her life.
It wasn’t too late to back out. Nothing had been signed, nothing made official. Surely someone else, anyone else would be better. Anyone else would know what to do, what to say—
The door opens behind her and Petra steps back into the room, coffee in hand.
“Oh, my sweet girl,” Petra says, rushing over to the bed’s opposite side. Diane keeps one arm around Teddy, but she lifts the other out for Petra who sets her coffee down and embraces her. “Is she in pain?” Petra asks, looking up at Rebecca over her shoulder.
Diane had just survived a fatal car accident and it hadn’t even crossed Rebecca’s mind that she might be in physical pain.
“I…she woke up and…she,” Rebecca pauses to breathe, gather her thoughts, “She asked about Bex. So…I told her. And—”
Maybe I did it wrong. Maybe I should’ve been gentler, kinder. Maybe I should’ve found you. Maybe I should’ve gotten Gray. I’ve fucked it all up and I haven’t even begun.
“Shhhhh,” Petra coos to Diane who starts to settle down in her arms.
“Thank you, Petra,” Rebecca whispers.
Eventually, Diane falls back asleep.
Rebecca hears a gentle tap on the window, and she turns to see Jade and Gray standing in the hallway. Knowing that Diane is safer in Petra’s care than her own, she quietly exits the room.
“How’s it going in there?” Gray asks eagerly, her smile bright, like she’s expecting nothing but a positive response.
“I think I might have a talent for making children cry,” Rebecca replies flatly. Gray’s smile falters, Jade looks at Rebecca with pity in her eyes. “She woke up. I told her Bex died. Not the happiest introduction.”
“I’m sure you did your best,” Jade says, patting Rebecca’s shoulder.
And maybe she had. Her best just wasn’t very good.
“Hugh is on his way here,” Jade says, “There’s quite a lot to discuss. How about I buy you the finest hospital cafeteria dinner while we go over everything?”
“Jade, I—”
She’s about to say, I don’t think I can do this. I’ve made a mistake thinking that I could.
But she’s interrupted by the sound of footsteps rushing down the hallway. All three of them instinctively step to the side assuming that it’s probably a nurse or doctor in a hurry, but when Rebecca turns her head, she has to blink a couple of times to believe what she’s seeing.
“Keeley?” she says, mouth agape.
Keeley doesn’t say a word as she drops a large tote bag on the ground and crushes Rebecca into a hug. “Hi, babe. Got here as fast as I could.”
Tears are falling from Rebecca’s eyes into Keeley’s hair. She’s never been so glad to see her. “How the fuck did you know I was here?” she sputters out, completely mystified.
“Ted called,” she says, stepping back from Rebecca, also wiping tears out of her eyes. Rebecca’s heart flutters. “He told me what happened, and we didn’t know how long you’d be here, so I went to your house and grabbed some things for you,” she gestures to the tote bag, “And he got Roy to call training early. Gave him a list of everything you’ll need to be toddler-ready, so the entire team’s out taking care of it right now.”
Keeley is breathless, the words spilling out a mile a minute, so it takes a moment for what she’s saying to really sink in. And when it does, all she can do is cry and cry and cry. Gray and Jade awkwardly step away from the emotional scene, and Rebecca only feels mild embarrassment for this display of emotions.
“Oh, babe,” a very weepy Keeley chokes out, once again circling her arms around Rebecca’s waist, “You’ve got this. And when you don’t got it, you just call me. Call any of us. We’d all move bloody mountains for you, yeah?”
If there is a miracle to be found amongst this tragedy, it’s that she’s gonna have you lookin’ out for her now. Ain’t nobody better, and that’s a fact.
But it wasn’t just Rebecca who would be looking out for her, it seemed.
It gave her confidence. It gave her courage. It gave her comfort.
Believe in miracles.
So she believes.